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What Works Better? Juice Cleanse vs. Smoothie Cleanse

Cleanses are very popular lately. Everyone wants to eat right, have a jump start on dieting, etc. Also a lot of pressed juice and smoothie stores have been popping up all over. So what is the difference between green juices and green smoothies?

Green Smoothies
A green smoothie is made by blending whole fruits and vegetables in a blender. You don’t even have to follow a recipe most of the time. I always make sure spinach is in my smoothies but kale and spring lettuce is also very popular. Then you can add your favorite fruits, a liquid (water, milk, coconut milk, etc.) and sometimes even protein powders or flax/chia seeds. The possibilities are endless.

Green Juice
Juicing is done by extracting liquids of whole foods in a juicing machine. The fruits and vegetables themselves are not used. Again not every juice needs a recipe. You can mix all different kinds of fruits and vegetables together.

So what is better?
My sister Cheryl and I decided to try a little experiment to see what is easier and more beneficial. A smoothie cleanse or a juice cleanse.

My sister got the 3 Day Blueprint Cleanse. Juicing is very time consuming and pretty expensive. Since you don’t use the whole food you need a lot more of it to make a decent amount of juice. Getting a cleanse through a juice company is usually easier, but can be expensive.

I decided to follow the 10 Day Green Smoothie Cleanse (for 3 days only). Even though it is supposed to be longer I wanted to try it out short term and see what kind of results came from it.

Preparing
So Cheryl and I did not prepare very well for the cleanse. We had decided to do it the beginning of the week to prepare for the 4th of July this weekend. Bathing suits eek! Unfortunately we had a lot going on this weekend and our diets suffered from it. I am always amazing during the week and once the weekend comes around I always tend to fail. We had been doing well the last few weeks since we had been staying in the area and doing a lot of exercise and activities. Friday I spent about 7 hours at my cousin’s house helping them clean the yard to get ready for their son’s first birthday party Saturday. Saturday was a BBQ and I had a light breakfast so by lunch I was starving. I had a lot of beer too, but didn’t really eat dinner since it was a late lunch. Sunday we went to the city to visit our cousin and bring him some furniture. I had a light breakfast and an ahi tuna burger for lunch. Later we went to the mall to run some errands and I got tired and backed out of running and wound up getting mango chicken in the food court. I felt SO SICK after I didn’t eat anything else. I keep forgetting that after weeks of eating healthy my body can’t handle grease and crap. Both cleanses tell you to eat healthy for the day before you start…failing already!

The Challenge
So today started our challenge. I was supposed to go to Crossfit this morning, but I was unable to fall asleep last night so I decided to sleep in. Cheryl went though so I have to make sure I walk on the treadmill at lunch to get exercise in. We have to try and keep to slightly the same exercise regimen to see what works better.

Juice Cleanse
Cheryl is doing the Renovation (beginner) cleanse and she gets 6 juices a day.

1 and 3 are Green Juice, 2 is PAM (pineapple, apple mint), 4 is is Spicy Lemonade, 5 is CAB (carrot, apple, beet) and 6 is Cashew Milk. She drinks these 6 juices throughout the day for 3 days. She is also supposed to have A LOT of water and she can have green or herbal tea.

Green Smoothie Cleanse
Since I am only doing 3 days of the 10 Day Green Smoothie Cleanse I decided to pick the 3 I thought would taste the best. Today I made the Peach Berry Smoothie.

I mixed it all in a blender then split it into 3 containers. I added some extra water after I split it up because I wanted to have more to drink.

I am allowed to have (if I want) crunchy vegetables like celery or apples and also unsalted peanut butter or nuts (a handful). I packed some for the day just in case but I hope I don’t need them. I also need to drink A LOT of water and I can have green, herbal or detox tea.

My smoothie for breakfast was good. Not as filling since I usually make my smoothies with coconut or almond milk and this one was made with water. I also have not used sweetener in a very long time. The recipe called for stevia but I used truvia packets. Not sure if I needed them, but I wanted to follow the directions as close as I could.

I will keep you updated how the cleanses go and what the overall results were later this week. Have you ever attempted a cleanse? I hope I can make it!